Announcing the Readers' Choice Award Winners

Can we pretend I'm Ryan Seacrest for just a moment? I feel as though this moment deserves a tuxedo and a gilded envelope...So, please dim the lights and let's open the envelope with our results!

Knitting Daily has voted, and here, in no particular order, are your Readers' Choice Award Winners:

Here they are: The top five patterns as selected by you!

Cable-Down Raglan, by Stefanie Japel

Nantucket Jacket, by Norah Gaughan

Sunrise Circle Jacket, by Kate Gilbert

Tweedy Aran Cardigan, by Norah Gaughan

Swallowtail Shawl, by Evelyn A. Clark

As promised, we have put together the five winning designs into a free eBook, which you will be able to download from now until 5 PM MST on Wednesday, May 14, 2008. After that, the eBook goes back into the vault and will not be available as a collection again.

I've gotta quote that guy in Indiana Jones for a moment here: You have all chosen wisely... The range of techniques and design elements in these Top Five is impressive, and together, these five designs truly display some of the most beautiful and innovative uses of the humble knit and purl stitch ever. First, we have the Swallowtail, a traditional lace shawl, designed by Evelyn Clark in a miniature—but still visually rich, still breathtakingly beautiful—version more suitable for modern wardrobes. Then, we have Stefanie Japel's elegantly worked Cable-Down Raglan, which uses ancient stitchery to produce a sweater with contemporary shaping and styling. Also worked in cables is the slightly more traditional Tweedy Aran Cardigan from Norah Gaughan, which adds modern curves and detailing to a well-loved cardigan style. The Nantucket Jacket, again from Norah Gaughan, starts with a very up-to-the-minute silhouette, and adds all-over pattern stitching, gussets, and some very beautiful detailing to produce a contemporary garment that sings with history. And finally, Kate Gilbert's Sunrise Circle Jacket takes the humble increase to places it has never been, producing a unique and beautiful jacket that is as fascinating to make as it is to wear.

Winners, all.

Stefanie, Kate, Norah, Evelyn: You bring us the best of knitting, so that we can aspire to be the best of knitters. Each of you is a gift to the knitting community, and we at Knitting Daily are blessed and honored to be able to share your work with our readers.

All right, Knitting Daily folks...haven't you got some downloading to do?

Download The Top 5: The Best of Interweave Knits Readers' Choice Awards (not available after May 14, 2008)

Enjoy! And need I say: Happy Knitting!

—Sandi

Meet The Winning Designers: Blog Tour!

We thought you'd like to hear from Kate, Norah, Evelyn, and Stefanie themselves, and then we thought it would be fun to have the winners be interviewed by some of your favorite knitting bloggers! So we're doing a Blog Tour—each day this week, we invite you to visit the blog indicated below for some behind-the-scenes scoop!

I have been trying to find a pattern for the Sunrise Circle Jacket ever since I saw the picture the first time. I found out about and joined knittingdaily yesterday, at which time I discovered that the pattern was FREE, but the offer ran out a month ago!! I am so very, very disappointed! Would anyone who downloaded it be willing to share it with another member? Please?

I love to learn and get to know other knitters out there. I got into a rut knitting lacy scarves, and now I,m wanting to do sweaters,vests, etc again after 21 years. I'll howl for help, using the blogs, as soon as I stop being intimidated by computers. I live in wyoming--truly more cows and horses than people. W fortunately have a great yarn shop, but my stash begs for allthose other choices out there,

I love all the patterns selected and I especially loved reading the blogs from the different designers. So much advise and inspiration for us somewhat "new" knitters. I would absolutely love it if Knitting Daily offered links from more bloggers. Keep us the good work. I always look forward to my daily does on KD.

Thank you for this collection of *lovely* designs. I get my IWK off the newstand, but never miss. I have really enjoyed Knitting Daily, too. AND I can't get enough of the Vine Lace Baby Hat. Thanks for that pattern, too.

Well I am very grateful for the free patterns from this site and wonderful designers. I guess not every pattern will please every person but I appreciate all knitters efforts to share their creativity.Thank you so much KD and designers.

I'm proud to say that a couple of years ago I made the Tweedy Aran Cardigan for myself. I substituted a different yarn so I had to do a lot of reknitting to make it work, but the effort was worth it. I love it and wear it frequently and always get lots of raves.

Hi, I have tried downloading free patterns that I like, from your site, but after I click download from my email notification, it goes to the Rustic Jacket pattern. I cannot get to any other pattern download, as it is only the rustic jacket pattern that is available on the web page. Please let me know if there is an error.

Sandi!!! Can you pull the magic yarn strings necessary to make the top ten finalist patterns available for purchase? I was hoping the waistcoat would end up on the list, too, as I'd like to knit that up!

yippee to norah on two designs chosen. everything i knit of norah's is both a challenge and absolutely beautiful. keep it up... to all of the fantastic designers who leave the fun parts of knitting up to us and take care of the headaches (for the most part) themselves.

Yay!!!! The E-book is here and I'm so excited about it. But what about the other patterns that didn't make the top five? Here's a thought in case no one has suggested it yet...what about making another e-book of the patterns that didn't make it into the top five?

Either way, I'm going to have to get a new binder for all my knitting patterns. I have two of the 1-inch binders and they're both already full, and that's not counting the books and magazines I have full of wonderful things to knit!

Thanks for the free download, and congratulations to all the designers of the top 5. I think it's the geek in me, but I'd be interested to see the stats - just how many people did vote and how close were the votes across the top 10?Also, will the patterns that didn't make the top 5 be available to purchase in the online pattern store?

A terrific bonus, with beautiful designs. All of your wonderful teaching and these too! Even if some were available before, I agree that it's a vote for the designers which could yield a long-term benefit - more garments from those designers published!Thanks, Sandi.

Yes, thank you for these patterns and well done designers. Are you going to add the other candidates to your store? I really thought (hoped) that the Venezia pullover would make it and would rather pay for download of that 1 pattern than pay enormous freight costs for the back issue to Australia.

Hi Monika I am having trouble understanding the key on your grasshopper chart. Please clarify what s2,k1.p2sso/s2,p1,p2sso means. Is p pass over or purl? I would like to knit this pattern. Please email me at lmerrante@comcast.net

I'd love to knit the Sunrise jacket, but I really can't work out how to adapt the pattern so that it fits a petite person, ie shorten neck to armhole, armhole to waist and waist to cast on while maintaining width.

How wonderfully talented these designers are and how fortunate are we to be the beneficiaries of their work! Thank you for providing these patterns to us.It is a tough decision as to which to make first!

Lovely designs. Thank you. I have a question about the cable down raglan, for which I have the pattern. It seems to curve in at the waist but the pattern has no waist decreases. Am I missing something?

Thank you to the wonderful designers of these patterns! They are beautiful examples of why I love to knit! A big thank you for consolidating them into this download and making them available free to us all - regardless of whether they were free before or not, I appreciate the opportunity! I agree with Pauline - snag them while you can as they may disappear when you least expect it!

Since it's the votes for the best design, I think, the designers deserve to get the appreciation. Yet I also belive the editors should have posted as a reward to the readers 5 designs that are not currently available. So it should have been 5 top designers to be nominated and 5 new designs to be made available for a limited time. Then it would have been a win-win situation.

Congratulations to the winners, twice for Nora G, and thanks for the patterns KD.

I thought the votes were for the sweaters, not just to snag free patterns though I love FREE. Knitters, gratefully grab the patterns while you can, because you can't count on any of them staying either free or on-line forever. For instance, a fabulous, once-free crochet sweater has vanished from the free column and migrated to the store. I'm sure others could do the same or simply disappear, in a database crash for instance.

thank you, very good post on reasons why of the choice and very good top 5 (note: the circle jacket has been everywhere on the net for download forever :-/ too bad cause we'd have had a real unavailable other fifth)

Oooh, I'm so surprised that the Caftan Pullover didn't make the final 5...and, yes, I agree that the Sunrise Circle Jacket is fabulous, but it was already free on this website, and I think the editors should have eliminated those already-free-on-KD choices from the Top Ten before we all were asked to vote, rather than expecting us to search the free pattern library before voting. Thanks for the three patterns that I did not have, although I cannot knit lace, so really two...but I'm still grateful.

I can't believe that enough people voted for a design that was already available free online to get it into this ebook. I'm glad to get the one pattern I didn't already have, but come on, people.. check the downloads section before you vote if KD ever does this again.